I've begun renting movies lately, and I've been disappointed. Some of my favorite directors had me ready and willing to enjoy some great cinematic fare, and while the films were good, they were not up to the level I'm accustomed to from these masters of direction.
The films, and their respective directors: The Big Lebowski, by the Coen brothers, Joel and Ethan; Live Flesh by Pedro Almodovar, and G.I. Jane, by Ridley Scott. In case you did not know, these are American, Spanish and British directors, in that respective order.
I have to confess that Ridley Scott is my favorite director of the three, and one of the three film masters I most respect. He has been directing for over 20 years, and his earliest work includes the first Alien film and Blade Runner; Thelma and Louise and G.I. Jane are the two most memorable films in his sparse productivity in the 1990s. However, G.I. Jane, his latest, is only mediocre at best. For Scott, the brilliant cinematography is noticeable in its absence; the quick editing, the storyline and the acting are all above average, but I felt cheated that it was a "meat-and-potatos" movie. No attempt what-so-ever was made to bring the film up to the emotional an d topical level that has been his trademark.
The Coen brothers are responsible for giving us Raising Arizona, Barton Fink and Fargo. Offbeat is an understatement and quirky is too generic for these films. Slow-boiling tension and off-center characters inhabit these movies, but The Big Lebowski I've re-titled The Big Letdown. The plot was contrived and the dialogue was forced; watching this was like watching a family re-union turn into a shouting match. With small moments that shone through, I've decided to give this film another viewing, as I did something rare in my life and turned off this one before the closing credits came around.
Pedro Almodovar produced one of the most outrageous films in cinema history, a film which gave Antonia Banderas more pronounced visibility and which led to his role (eventually) in Interview With The Vampire, with Tom Cruise. That film was Tie Me Up, Tie Me Down, with Victoria Abril (one of Europe's most respected actresses, but hardly known within the US). Almodovar wraps otherwise ordinary plots around our reactions to sex and sexual matters. His most recent film to cross over from Spain is Live Flesh, and while the subject matter is familiar, and the story and film are very good, again, previous achievements left me wondering.
What's going on with these directors? I understand that there is an evolution, a maturation process, that occurs in creative people, and in humans in general. But I'm also left wondering why they have not brought their talents to newer social trends and influences. Where are the new films such as 2001 and Alien? Where is the next JFK, or Psycho, or Fatal Attraction? Blazing Saddles, or The Holy Grail? What about drama, such as Map Of The Human Heart, or Wings Of Desire?
Since the release of Pulp Fiction, the trend appears to be the copycat film, more so than ever before. The Batman series, the James Bond series (which at least continues to hold its own), and now Halloween, Alien, and anything made before 1980 all are wearing out the big screen. Even films which do not rise to mediocre have become franchise films: I Know What You Did Last Summer, Scream, Airplane (more specifically, after Naked Gun: Hotshots, and now the occasional generic spoof: Fatal Instinct, Mafia, etc.). Star Trek and Lethal Weapon should also be retired.
There is more here however than a call to end serial filming. Where are the directors who will break away from these sequels to give us one-shot, worthwhile, emotionally and intellectually engaging cinema? Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez are only two directors who have risen above the rest, and this was not so much a conscious effort on their part as an effort simply to maintain a sense of pride in their work and produce solid movies.
The directors of Delicatessen, a tandem duo by the names of Jean-Pierre Jeunet and Marc Caro, are starting to come up the ladder. They have since directed City Of Lost Children (with Ron Perlman, among others, for a lead actor) and Jeunet went solo to helm the fourth Alien film, the best since the imprimatur. Luc Besson, whose most recent Fifth Element also shows promise. His work includes La Femme Nikita, which was horribly remade as an American film, Point Of No Return, and The Professional, a solid piece about a hitman becoming father to an orphaned girl. But gone are the Oliver Stones, the Mel Brooks, the Monty Pythons, and the rest of the list.
Stanley Kubrick, who directed 2001, Lolita, Clockwork Orange, as well as Stephen King's The Shining, has a new film coming out soon, called Eyes Wide Shut. Starring Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman, average actors, the plot concerns a married couple who are both psychiatrists who have separate affairs with another married couple. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that Kubrick hangs around long enough to finish another project, called A.I., which is the moniker for artificial intelligence. While Eyes Wide Shut covers sexual territory broadly explored in both Lolita and Almodovar's Tie Me Up, Tie Me Down, A.I. goes back to the concept of 2001: machines and their ability to think for themselves, risking the chance of becoming conscious, self-aware entities. I hope to see new thoughts and perspective applied to at least one of Kubrick's two films here, or face another letdown in the process.
Even brilliant directors cannot coast on past success; it is they who inspire the Tarantinos, the Coens, the Rodriguez's and Almodovars. Covering old themes without adding perspective of maturity or evolution, without anything to distinguish a new film from an older work, has the effect of discouraging viewers and directors alike. nbsp;The sequels are doing so well because Americans in general are accustomed more and more to seeing the same film with no distinctive direction. Direction includes plot, plot revision, editing, cinematography, settings, costumes, and of course acting. The last really good films I've seen were Contact, by Robert Zemeckis (who I will never forgive for directing Gump) and Something About Mary, by the Farrelly brothers, who began with Dumb & Dumber. Contact was easily the better of the two, but "Mary" was arguably the smartest comedy to come along in a few years.
I'm concerned that directors are uninspired and that American film is headed to a darker place than the dim theatres we already visit. I'm concerned when Independence Day, Godzilla or Titanic consume three screens apiece in theatres which only have six, when they cost enough to feed the populations of several cities, when they stay before us for months at a time. When these films could be about something more than entertainment and still not suffocate us with seriousness.
I'm concerned that the next Tarantino will be content to direct the next Scream film, and that future directors will look to Titanic for inspiration.